Housing crisis worsens in Idlib and exploiting the tragedy of displaced people increases the random camps

The winter arrived as hundreds of thousands of civilians are displacing from the southern and eastern countryside of Idlib, at a time when almost no humanitarian organization is helping, leading to the spread of hundreds of random camps.

Volunteer groups are attempting to create temporary homes to become a destination for the displaced families and avoid tents.

It is also a job opportunity for many, a large proportion of the displaced people who are in a good financial situation are buying agricultural land, build houses, or buying ready-to-move-in houses in several towns of the Syrian north.

Deir Hassan is one of the most visited towns to which the displaced people who want to buy and own homes come.

As demand for homes and land is dramatically increasing, the price of land suitable for construction and housing increased dramatically with it, also house prices rose significantly.

Now the prices are beyond the purchasing power of a large proportion of the displaced families.

According to sources of the Syrian Observatory, the prices of land and houses in “Deir Hassan” town began to rise significantly in the last months of last year for several reasons, including the population density in the town, also many property owners of the houses and lands are exploiting the displaced people’s situation to raise prices significantly.

Also, a new phenomenon appeared, where these lands and houses are being traded by many of the crisis-dealers and other low-moral people, who buy large areas of land in addition to houses, then offer them for sale to the displaced families who want to buy them at a very high price, it may be up to twice the real price.

Deir Hassan town is witnessing an active construction business as thousands of people have fled towards it, because of its proximity to the border with Turkey.

Sources of the “Syrian Observatory” confirmed that there are areas inside “Deir Hassan” town close to commercial markets and population density; the price of a meter of land in is between 15 to 20 thousand Syrian pounds, while the agricultural land around the town and on its outskirts, the price of one meter of land is between five thousand and ten thousand Syrian pounds.

While the price of a two-room house is between $2,500 to $3,000. It is a rudimentary, roofless, and incomplete house, the price of such a house maybe twice that figure within the town.

This unacceptable rise for many displaced families made many of them resort to settling in tents on the outskirts of the town living in harsh living conditions, and at the same time, the displaced people now facing difficult choices: either buying a house at a high price, or buying and piece of land and building over it, but the most difficult option that many have suffered, is homelessness out in the open and in the worn-out tents and cold winter.